How Did I Use Sweatshops In Retail Fashion?

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Recommended: Sweatshops unethical practises

Who doesn’t love finding perfect prices when shopping on a budget? Everyone wants the cheapest price for the most products. That was how I was as a consumer, especially in retail fashion. Although I learned about sweatshops back in seventh grade I did not think that I can have such a direct and big impact with just a simple purchase. I have become a more informed and conscious consumer after taking this course as I question not only my ethics, but those of the companies that I shop from.
I knew that sweatshops were bad, children are exposed to hazardous environments, workers are underpaid, and production is polluting the environment, but I could not see myself as part of the problem. I’m pretty sure purchasing one shirt from Wal-Mart does …show more content…

During one of our class exercises, our task was to look up the registered number of our article of clothing. As far as I’m concerned, I thought a “Made in China” tag was good enough to say where my clothes were made, but with a RN number it lets me track it all the way back to the factory of where it was made. This exercise stuck out to me because it revealed another part of the apparel industry that I never knew before. For example, I did not know that H&M could hire a company to source their clothes, and that company can hire different factories that also hire other sub-factories and so on to do the work. This led to a great ethical question of consumers not being able to see the full picture, where there is no transparency in the sourcing and production process. The brand can say one thing on their website, but have a different story when it comes to the actual production. I remember unconsciously searching for the RN number on a sweater while shopping, and noting it down to look it up later to see where the product was made. I continued to do that for a couple more of items to get a gist of where the store was mostly selling from. Never would I have thought of double checking tags on clothing, but felt that if I wanted to support ethical companies I should start now. Although consumers should not have to do their own research on a brand, it is better to be an informed consumer than an ignorant

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